Marcus Smart Named the NBA's Defensive Player of the Year
April 20, 2022
We finally did it folks. On Monday afternoon, Marcus Smart was officially named the 2021-22 Kia Defensive Player of the Year for the NBA. It’s been a long time coming for Smart, who has made his bones on defense throughout his eight year career in Boston. He has twice been named first team all-defense with a third nod appearing to be a virtual lock this season, but this award means so much more.
Smart is only the second Celtic ever to win the prestigious award; the first being Kevin Garnett - pretty decent and fitting company. Beyond that, Smart is also only the second guard to ever win the award, the first since Gary Payton in 1996. Lately, this has become a big man’s award, and has essentially gone to the best rim protector in the league for years, with Rudy Gobert winning in three of the past four seasons.
So it’s a pleasant surprise to see the voting block shifting with the league to represent a more perimeter oriented game. Nobody has embodied that better than Marcus Smart has for the Boston Celtics this season. And while Smart’s position on the court is technically point guard, he does so much more than what can be recognized by the bounds of any one position. Smart is the captain and the quarterback of the best defense in basketball. He calls out the defense and alignment every possession, directing switches and rotations in real time, sometimes even physically pushing his teammates into the right spots. Listening to Smart play defense is almost as much fun as watching him play defense, as he is essentially a coach on the floor for his teammates on the defensive end of the floor.
Ime Udoka came into Boston and turned a group of good to great defenders into an elite defensive team. It started with the buy-in and commitment from his best defender, Smart. Smart has taken on a huge leadership role for this team, beyond being their heart and soul, and it has paid immediate dividends. He truly does it all on the floor. He’ll frequently start off by guarding the other team’s best perimeter player but given the Celtics defensive scheme, Smart switches as frequently as any player in the league, especially on ball screens. Smart’s ability to maneuver those switches without creating any advantage for the offense is a huge key to why the Celtics have been able to thrive on that end. This leads to Smart being matched up with almost any player at any time. He’s not just battling on the perimeter, he’ll mix it up in the midrange with bigger wings, and even battle in the paint with true bigs - a welcome sight for Celtics fans. Smart is just too strong and too quick to give anything up, even to much taller players. He has even had his share of highlights protecting the rim, including a couple of signature blocks on players like Giannis and Jarrett Allen. Hell even in game 1 he did an amazing job of rotating under the hoop and meeting Kevin Durant in midair while perfectly maintaining his verticality and taking a huge hit from KD, while forcing him to miss the layup.
There is nothing Smart can’t do for the Celtics, and over and over we’ve seen him go out there and do whatever the team needs in the biggest moments. Whether it’s forcing a steal, deflecting a pass, blocking a shot, taking a charge, diving for a loose ball, or anything else, you can expect Smart to be the guy to do it - and especially when the game is on the line. The runners up for this year's award included guys like Mikal Bridges, Rudy Gobert, Bam Adebayo, and Jaren Jackson Jr. Any of those players would have been worthy recipients and are certainly all great defenders. But nobody was as consistently dominant and versatile defender. The fact that that dominance propelled the Celtics to have the best defense in the league this season was the icing on the cake, and clearly the voters agreed. The only players I think could have a reasonable case as more impactful and versatile defenders for their teams this season are Bam and Draymond Green, but Bam played in only 56 of 82 games this year while Draymond only played in 46 while Marcus was up at 71 games. The difference of 15 (or 25) extra games of Smart on the floor could have been the difference between the league’s top ranked defense, and the 4th (Golden State) or 6th (Miami).
Ultimately, this is a one year award, but it feels like a culmination for Boston fans who have supported Smart for years through thick and thin. The focus, of course, is all on the playoffs and the Brooklyn Nets. But it was great to take a day off from the stress and drama to just enjoy this achievement and national recognition for a player that means as much to the city as Smart does for Boston. In a very cool ceremony, Udoka held Smart back after practice on Monday to “watch some extra film”. During this time, the rest of the team prepared a ceremony on the practice court in the Auerbach Center where former DPOY, Gary Patyon showed up to present the trophy and award to Smart in person. It was a very cool moment, and what really made it for me was seeing how much his teammates cared. You could tell those guys were just as excited and fired up for Marcus as he was to win. Stuff just shows how connected and locked in these guys are, and how much of a brotherhood this Celtics team is right now. If you haven’t seen the video I highly recommend taking a couple minutes and finding it on Twitter. It’s time to shift the focus back to the Nets and tonight’s game 2, but we can still soak it in, Celtics fans. We love him and we trust him. And now he is officially the Defensive Player of the Year. Congratulations, Marcus!
Ben Handler